Next Speaker:
Q&A session featuring a
panel of brides!
Your chance to ask the questions that you, as wedding professionals, have been wanting to ask real brides.
January's Speaker
Meredith Liepelt, CEO of Rich Life Marketing
With enough creativity, energy and wit to spare, Meredith Liepelt helps her clients gain visibility, credibility and an increased celebrity profile through authentic self-promotion. Fans include small business owners and solopreneurs who are ready to build buzz about their business so they can change the world with their unique gifts and talents.
Meredith is the founder of Rich Life Marketing, based in Columbus, Ohio. She is the author of the book Flourish! 10 Easy, Elegant and Essential Marketing Strategies for Solo and Micropreneur and is a co-author ofbest-selling book The Gratitude Book Project. In addition to her own writing, Meredith is featured in several other high profile business books and speaks at meetings, conferences and teleseminars for women business owners. She has been featured in entrepreneur.com, MSN.com, Portfolio.com, ABC, NBC, Business First, The Columbus Dispatch, as well as a multitude of newspapers and radio shows.
Febuary's Speaker
Rick Hostrup, Posh Event Services
Rick Hostrup has been an owner of two special event companies during the past twenty five years, specializing in scenery, decorations, props and lighting. As the corporate décor market began to slow, Variations began concentrating on custom services and décor for ethnic wedding ceremonies.
Through a study of immigration trends in America, a successful new ethnic weddings industry was created. At the time it was the only US Company specializing in ethnic weddings.
Variations have served a very diverse clientele, from a Hindu wedding atop a mountain in Malibu, CA to Russian Orthodox weddings in New York's Central Park. Variations were featured on the style channel of "Whose Wedding Is It Anyway?" for the first Muslim wedding ever aired on the program.
Rick has expanded ethnic wedding services to include Hindu, Sikh, Muslim, Buddhist, Jewish and Orthodox Christian weddings. In 2007 Variations was sold to Lasting Impressions Rental. He purchased the company back in 2010, but has since joined Posh Event Services in Delaware, OH who purchased the remaining props and scenery.
To date, Rick has decorated over 400 ethnic weddings throughout the United States.
Subject: A presentation and training class on ethnic weddings.
March's Speaker
Kathy Piech Lukas
"HOW REALITY TV IS IMPACTING"
The first reality show, "Real World", appeared on MTV in 1988. The couples getting married today have never known a life without reality TV! This presentation will talk about the different reality TV shows out there and, based on surveys taken by real brides and wedding vendors, how it is impacting buying decisions and setting expectations for your services. Also hear the perspectives from wedding vendors that have participated in reality televisions and how to keep your business looking positive dispite a producer's agenda that doesn't include yours if you are on one.
Kathy Piech-Lukas, president of Your Dream Day LLC, earned her bachelor's degree from Xavier University. She has more than 14 years of event planning experience, including weddings, concerts, large scale special events, trade shows, product launches, and corporate events. She worked as a marketing communications specialist and public affairs
manager for two different Fortune 500 companies, in addition to a variety of other public relations and marketing positions, before opening the company in 2002. Wedding vendors and friends encouraged her to become a wedding planner because of her extreme attention to detail, tenacity, and friendly, upbeat and outgoing personality. She has served as the co-coordinator of the
Kathy Piech-Lukas Your Dream Day LLC 513-241-2777/ Cincinnati 937-746-4617 Dayton www.yourdreamday.com
April's Speaker
Q&A session featuring a
panel of brides!
Your chance to ask the questions that you, as wedding professionals, have been wanting to ask real brides.
May's Speaker
Mary McCarthy
President, Your Management Team
Mary, a small business consultant and President of MLM Consulting, is the developer and founder of Your Management Team. As a small business owner Mary has lived the challenges of starting, surviving, and growing a business. After developing two start-up businesses Mary moved into business consulting and business brokerage assisting business owners develop concepts, improve processes, and sell their business. The 20 years experience starting, owning, consulting and selling businesses provided the foundation and experience to develop a program for other business owners to assist them navigate the challenges with a clear and defined path, rather than by trial and error.
Mary understands the hours, dedication and focus needed to own and manage a business.
Mary can be reached at:
(614) 602-6530
614-937-3197
Mary@your
Management
Team.net
June's Speaker
Rod Randall
Buckeye Sounds
Rod DJed his first ever event, a wedding reception, at the Concourse Airport Hotel back in August of 1991 for $275 (he still has the contract)! He didn't sleep much the night before, and had to borrow most of the equipment. That event led to the creation of Buckey Sounds, named after Rod's favorite football team of course!
In just a few years Buckeye Sounds would go from a part time job to a full time as business continued to grow. In the mid 90's Buckeye Sounds began to provide entertainment for many local highschools. In January of 2000 they did their first ever bat mitzvah. The addition of interactive dancers and MCs specifically for bar and bat mitzvahs resulted in Buckeye Sounds becoming one of the largest mitzvah entertainment companies in Columbus.
This August Buckeye Sounds will celebrate 20 years in business, and to celebrate they opened a new office/showroom in Gahanna in January 2011. This facility allows clients to come in and see the entertainment they are considering as well as offers a training facility for the DJs, MCs and dancers.
To contact Rod:
Buckeye Sounds
July's Speaker
Bart Krogman
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614-581-5752
bart@flourish
bespoke.com
August's Speaker
Cameron Mitchell